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Probably after the relative busyness of the holidays, a sense of 'deep breath' for the upcoming months, and some medical issues (nothing serious), I haven't read any new books. I decided to go on a binge of Martha Wells starting with The Element of Fire. It takes place in a quasi-late Renaissance. Although there's a king, he's weak and his mother, the dowager Queen Ravenna still has firm control of the reins. For instance, she has not given up control of the Queen's Guards whose leader, Thomas Boniface, is her long-time ally. At a perhaps inopportune time, Ravenna's husband's (long dead) illegitimate daughter by a Fayre (faerie) queen has decided to return to the court to try to reconcile her memories and hang-ups. When she was removed from the court about 10 years earlier, she was sent to a nunnery "to finish her education" which she did by learning more magic from the hedge witches in the area. Kade Carrion, as she's called, ends up in the middle of a coup attempt by a favorite of the king in alliance with the unseelie court (Dark Host) and a wizard from a neighboring enemy country. Most of the book is spent on-the-run. The characters are strongly drawn and even the 'bad' ones have well-developed back stories and reasons for what they're doing. It's great fun. It's also available free at Martha Wells's website.
I then read Death of the Necromancer which occurs in the same city a couple of hundred of years later. It's roughly fin de siecle with pistols, carriages, and trains (but no cars yet). Nicholas Valiarde is putting the final touches on a complex scheme to ruin a nobleman who caused the death of Nicholas's foster father. To do so, he is also a leading criminal named Donatien who has gathered around him various friends, acquaintances, and 'gold-hearted' criminals. Mainly he needed money to trigger the plot, and the easiest way is through criminal means. It also enabled to keep tabs on the noble's nefarious doings--the noble's not above blackmail, etc. Nicholas's main friends are Arisilde Damal, perhaps the most powerful wizard living, if he wasn't drug-addled most of the time, Reynard Morane, a calvary officer cashiered for being involved indirectly in the death of his aristocratic lover, and Madeline Denare, a young actress who Nicholas helped cover up a murder (in self defense, of course). They become involved in a plot by long-dead wizard to resurrect himself. Again, the characters are extremely well drawn. In particular, the main female characters are in integral part of the action. The characters are also very intelligent. Even on the run, they're always trying to figure out how to change the tide, even if it's only to escape and start plotting revenge.
Not willing to read the Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy right now, I decided to read The Cloud Roads which was released last year. The sequel, The Serpent Sea, is officially released this month (January 2012), but was available online in late December. With some questions to things that I thought were answered in the first book, I decided to pick it up again. Set on a planet with Three Worlds (earth, air, water), it's full of different races, most of which are not genetically compatible. There is evidence of many older cultures that have fallen or been wiped out over the years. The main character is Moon. He has two forms. His groundling form enables him to fit in with many of the Three Worlds cultures, but he has a second form, complete with wings and a tail, that he keeps hidden. That form looks very similar to one of the creatures of the 'Fell', a rapacious race that may inveigle their way into a city, but then usually eats the inhabitants. He knows he's not Fell, but has never found any others like him since his mother and siblings were killed about 20 years previously. Uncovered by groundling village that he was currently living with, they block his shifting ability and stake him out to be killed. He's rescued by Stone, a member of the Raksura--which turns out to be the race that Moon belongs to.
Stone has been looking for a consort, a fertile male, who can mate with the younger queen of his colony. Rebuffed by other colonies, he just happened across Moon on his way home. As I said in the previous review, Stone reminds me a bit of Leroy Jethro Gibbs (of NCIS) for his closed-mouth, liberal with the smacks to the head when someone's being stupid. Thinking only that he's going to help Stone fight the Fell, Moon agrees to accompany him to the Indigo Cloud Court where things get a lot more complicated. Although it's hard to keep the Raksura straight beyond the main characters, they're again well-developed. The book ends well, without obvious sequelitis, but The Serpent Sea does pick up immediately with new problems. I'm rereading it now!
I then read Death of the Necromancer which occurs in the same city a couple of hundred of years later. It's roughly fin de siecle with pistols, carriages, and trains (but no cars yet). Nicholas Valiarde is putting the final touches on a complex scheme to ruin a nobleman who caused the death of Nicholas's foster father. To do so, he is also a leading criminal named Donatien who has gathered around him various friends, acquaintances, and 'gold-hearted' criminals. Mainly he needed money to trigger the plot, and the easiest way is through criminal means. It also enabled to keep tabs on the noble's nefarious doings--the noble's not above blackmail, etc. Nicholas's main friends are Arisilde Damal, perhaps the most powerful wizard living, if he wasn't drug-addled most of the time, Reynard Morane, a calvary officer cashiered for being involved indirectly in the death of his aristocratic lover, and Madeline Denare, a young actress who Nicholas helped cover up a murder (in self defense, of course). They become involved in a plot by long-dead wizard to resurrect himself. Again, the characters are extremely well drawn. In particular, the main female characters are in integral part of the action. The characters are also very intelligent. Even on the run, they're always trying to figure out how to change the tide, even if it's only to escape and start plotting revenge.
Not willing to read the Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy right now, I decided to read The Cloud Roads which was released last year. The sequel, The Serpent Sea, is officially released this month (January 2012), but was available online in late December. With some questions to things that I thought were answered in the first book, I decided to pick it up again. Set on a planet with Three Worlds (earth, air, water), it's full of different races, most of which are not genetically compatible. There is evidence of many older cultures that have fallen or been wiped out over the years. The main character is Moon. He has two forms. His groundling form enables him to fit in with many of the Three Worlds cultures, but he has a second form, complete with wings and a tail, that he keeps hidden. That form looks very similar to one of the creatures of the 'Fell', a rapacious race that may inveigle their way into a city, but then usually eats the inhabitants. He knows he's not Fell, but has never found any others like him since his mother and siblings were killed about 20 years previously. Uncovered by groundling village that he was currently living with, they block his shifting ability and stake him out to be killed. He's rescued by Stone, a member of the Raksura--which turns out to be the race that Moon belongs to.
Stone has been looking for a consort, a fertile male, who can mate with the younger queen of his colony. Rebuffed by other colonies, he just happened across Moon on his way home. As I said in the previous review, Stone reminds me a bit of Leroy Jethro Gibbs (of NCIS) for his closed-mouth, liberal with the smacks to the head when someone's being stupid. Thinking only that he's going to help Stone fight the Fell, Moon agrees to accompany him to the Indigo Cloud Court where things get a lot more complicated. Although it's hard to keep the Raksura straight beyond the main characters, they're again well-developed. The book ends well, without obvious sequelitis, but The Serpent Sea does pick up immediately with new problems. I'm rereading it now!
